Consumers today don’t simply want to engage with brands, they want to be inspired. Companies like Airbnb, CVS Health and Centene are creating loyal customer relationships because they are doing business with a sense of purpose that their customers believe in. Jonathan Mildenhall, CMO of Airbnb, believes, “Purpose-driven companies create more value, create a bigger impact in the world, and they manage to attract and retain talent much, much more effectively than business-driven companies. Airbnb has always had this noble purpose and our purpose transcends the products and the technology and the category.” If you are trying to build a purpose-based brand that inspires your customers, emulating the marketing leaders from these three companies is a good place to start.

Mildenhall joined the Airbnb from Coca-Cola because he believed in the mission of the company. He says “The company vision has an audacious vision. It's a beautiful, big, audacious vision. And that is one day, all seven and a half billion people will feel that they can belong anywhere through the products and services of Airbnb.” That vision impacts all the marketing at the company. Mildenhall asks, “How does technology serve the vision? How does pop culture enable the vision? How does creativity enable the vision? Everything in our brand strategy stems from that noble vision of one day, we will all be able to belong anywhere.”

His advice for other marketing leaders who want to do inspiring marketing? “There is no way that any marketer can achieve a consistent level of [inspiring] creative output without the empowerment of his team or her team. So how do you show up as a human being? And does your humanity inspire the creativity of other people? Are you seen to be somebody who's curious and open and questioning and nurturing? I try every day. Sometimes I fail miserably but I try every day to show up being the best human being for my team that I possibly can be, so people walk out of a room after they've been in my company feeling an inch or so taller and a whole lot more confident in the ideas that they're nurturing,” Mildenhall advises.